Kronos Quartet and Tom Waits performed last Saturday and Sunday for 40,000+ people at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, California, as part of the 21st annual Bridge School Benefit organized by Neil Young and his wife, Pegi. Reports all point to the Waits/Kronos set as "the day's most thrilling" (San Jose Mercury News) and "the undisputed highlight of the concert" (Rolling Stone).
Kronos Quartet and Tom Waits performed last Saturday and Sunday for 40,000+ people at the Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, California, as part of the 21st annual Bridge School Benefit organized by Neil Young and his wife, Pegi. Reports all point to the Waits/Kronos set as "the day's most thrilling" (San Jose Mercury News) and "the undisputed highlight of the concert" (Rolling Stone).
The Wall Street Journal agrees. In yesterday's Journal, Jim Fusilli writes that "Kronos added a swirling, slashing and altogether thrilling accent to Mr. Waits's singular songs." He points, in particular, to the Quartet's "tender support for Mr. Waits's miraculous ballad 'Day After Tomorrow' and violinist David Harrington's gypsy solos in 'Way Down in the Hole'" for giving Waits's music "the kind of exploration and attention it deserves while accenting the gravitas it already has. He's a national treasure and so is Kronos, as their set illustrated with stunning clarity."
Joel Selvin, the senior pop music critic at the San Francisco Chronicle, also calls attention to the "Way Down in the Hole" performance. It's a song that's gotten a lot of attention over the past few years as the show opener on HBO's acclaimed series The Wire, with a different performer interpreting the song each season. According to Selvin, Waits's own interpretation for the Bridge show was a memorable one in a "sensational set" that embodies what the benefit has come to represent: "The Bridge concert is known for exactly such one-of-a-kind events as Waits, who makes very few public performances in any case, doubling up with Kronos, the celebrated San Francisco classical renegades."
Kronos and Waits have performed together before. In 2003, they joined forces for a benefit concert in support of Richard Gere's Healing the Divide organization. (You can hear the track "God's Away on Business" from that event on the Kronos MySpace page.) Even so, the Contra Costa Times says that last weekend's reunion "felt like we were witnessing a once-in-a-lifetime occasion. The ensemble produced utterly spine-chilling versions of some of Waits's finest compositions."
Brad Kava, writing on Kava's Radio Soup, calls the inspired pairing "a tour de force for the Bridge," and praises Waits for "using an acoustic forum before 20,000 people [each night] to really try something adventurous ... one of the the most artistic moments in 21 years of Bridge School benefit concerts."
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Photo courtesy of Sidney Chen.
